STRATEGIC FOCUS

As part of my MBA program, I'm taking a competitive strategy class online (which is awesome - class in my jammies!) We've been talking a lot about a company's mission and vision as it relates to strategy. Most (I believe) of my classmates work for large companies, totally unlike my little, one person writing and editing business. So our perspectives are different - which is actually great for the class because it gives me a way to contribute.

But because my business is just me, everything we talk about is more personal for me. My company's vision is my vision; my company's mission is my mission; and my company's strategy is my strategy. We are intertwined. I'm thinking that this is an ideal situation even for large companies - to have each employee's personal vision, mission, and strategy aligned with the company's. If an employee follows his personal mission to achieve his vision according to his personal strategy, and that is intertwined and aligned with the company's, it can do nothing else but help that company excel.

What is challenging for me in this whole strategic mission and vision process is focus. Sometimes I have so many ideas about how to operate and promote my business that I get distracted. The first step, of course, is to align everything I do with my vision and mission. My mission is to help people say what they want to say and my vision is when someone needs writing or editing services, they will think, “Get that Wordsy Woman!” and hire me. Helping people say what they want to say is the bar against which I compare everything I do; if it helps people say what they want to say, I consider it, if it doesn’t, I dismiss it.

This doesn’t eliminate everything, however, and I realized recently even more focus is needed, so I’ve decided that other than serving my current and future paying clients, I will choose three additional projects to work on over the next three months. I’m still getting ideas, but I’m writing them down in a notebook to evaluate at the end of the three months. This way, I can have enough focus to follow the strategies I’ve chosen, but I won’t lose any new ideas. 

Happy strategizing!

-The Wordsy Woman